Collection Overview
Title: Young McDonald Collection
Dates: 1877-1940
Creator: Eleanor Stearns Young MacDonald
Repository: Drew Archival Library
Call Number: DAL.MSS.121
Accession Number:
Location: Fogg Archives Room
Quantity: 1 box
Language: English

Administrative Information
Access Restriction: Collection is open to researchers
Acquisition Information: Donation prior to 2007
Preferred Citation: DAL.MSS.121, Young MacDonald Collection, Duxbury Rural & Historical Society
Finding Aid Prepared by Kathleen O’Connor

Scope and Content:
The Young MacDonald Collection features ephemera, legal documents, and photographs of the family of Eleanor Stearns (Young) McDonald. The highlight of the collection is MacDonald’s 1916 diary, which not only describes the daily life of a wealthy teenage girl in Brookline, MA but also her feelings about WWI. Numerous legal documents describe the estate of MacDonald’s paternal grandparents. Collection photographs are mostly scenes from the 1930s.

Biographical Sketch:
The Young family moved to Duxbury as part of the summer migration of wealthy residents of Brookline to the South Shore in the early 1900s. Peabody and Stearns, a prominent Boston architectural firm known for the shingle and colonial styles built the family’s house at 58 King Caesar Rd. in 1906.

Eleanor Stearns (Young) MacDonald was the daughter of William Hill Young and Eleanor Stearns. She was born in Brookline, MA in 1901. Her father was a banker, and her mother was the daughter of architect John Goddard Stearns Jr. After building their summer estate in Duxbury, the Youngs became members of the Duxbury Yacht Club. On June 30, 1923, Eleanor married Roderick Noyes MacDonald. The couple had two children: Roderick Noyes McDonald (b. 1925) and Elizabeth Abbott MacDonald.

Series List:
Series I – Diary of Eleanor Stearns Young (1916)
Series II – Ephemera
Series III – Legal Documents
Series IV – Photographs